Beastforged Bond

I certainly hadn’t expected my trip to the auction house to turn out like that. Even though my stockpile of marketable armaments was down to a handful of Master-ranked weapons and other items that looked more like collectibles than something truly saleable, I had expected as much. Heck, if Zenovia and Serviath had been more interested in Kazriel’s techniques than the weapons themselves, I would have emptied the onyx ring and let them look through the library.

It was all to make a substantial amount of money to heal my World and have enough left to push back toward my prime, and to help the Zerogs and my family. They deserved a more pleasant life after Merlin and I uprooted them in the Bastion.

Pushing the guilt festering in my heart aside, I focused on the task at hand. It was time to return home and drink Serviath’s Elixir. While blindly trusting the strange human was most definitely not a good idea, it felt as though Zenovia and he genuinely wanted to help. They could have taken the mask and confiscated it, since it was illegal to possess. In the worst case, the two could have had me incarcerated, throwing me into a cell to rot. But they did not. If anything, it seemed they had never even considered it, which I was grateful for. I really didn’t want to go to jail when I could be out here, working relentlessly to fix my World.

All in all, I was more than satisfied with how things had turned out. The high-ranking Elixir, in particular, was especially valuable.

Glancing down at the golden card, I smiled wryly. Even though my items had yet to be sold, I had already received a significant sum from the auction house. It was definitely worth it.

Storing the card away, I stepped out of the auction house and into the market. Several holographic images depicting the hottest items in the catalogue popped up all around me, but I walked past them. Low-quality Elixirs, serums, and various other goods might be useful, but they wouldn’t disappear. One step at a time. One World-crumbling issue at a time.

Focusing on leaving as quickly as possible, I barely registered more than muffled voices ringing in my ears. I caught only a fleeting red flash as the voices grew louder once more. Something prodded at my mind, yet I wanted nothing more than to return home. That was until a single word cut through the air, loud and clear.

“Pyaera!”

I recognized the word right away. How could I not? How… how could I ever forget that… forget them?

My mind went blank, and I froze in my tracks. Someone bumped into me from behind, cursing me out for being an inconsiderate asshole and telling me to pay more attention to my surroundings, but I didn’t move. After a few more curses, the man walked around me, staring daggers as though he were about to pounce on me, but my head snapped toward the source of the voice.

Toward a young humanoid hurriedly making his way through the bustling crowd that separated us.

The moment I saw him, and the group behind him, I wanted nothing more than to run. To flee and escape. My stomach churned, and I nearly vomited in the middle of the market, yet anxiety and overwhelming guilt were far from all I felt. I was also happy, overjoyed to see the young man calling out to me and the people standing behind him.

Puffs of smoke rose from his red skin as he made his way toward me, his veins still churning with streams of molten magma. Crimson, glowing orbs, oozing with a mixture of joy and ever-present battlelust, met my eyes, bringing a faint, uncertain smile to my lips.

He towered above me at nearly two meters when he finally reached me, yet he didn’t look nearly as imposing as I had expected. Most importantly, it didn’t look like he was out for my life.

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The young man was a Caldera. A Caldera of the Fire Tribe, to be precise.

Firecracker, also known as Orieath, blessed by the Fire Spirit. And with him was an old man, along with several other Fire Caldera, some of whom I recalled. They were all Spirit-touched individuals whom I or the other Blessed had fought in the Katrak years ago.

As for the old man, he was none other than the Spiritcaller.

“What are you doing here, Pyaera?” Orieath asked happily, as if nothing had happened.

As if the Caldera and humans weren’t at war because Raffael Torch and several other Rulers had been foolish enough to attack Volca’s Voice, trampling the Caldera’s generosity and kindness before killing some of them as well. True, Raffael Torch hadn’t intended to kill them, but it was obvious that the Caldera had tried to protect the Elemental Phoenix, as it was their Spirit Beast in more than one sense.

The Fire Caldera were highly attuned to the might and influence of Volca, the Fire Spirit, so it was only natural that they would protect Volca’s Voice. But they had failed to protect the Elemental Phoenix, their bodies crushed by a Magma Dragon’s tail.

Even though I had been busy in the last few years, my life a chaotic mess, I had never forgotten that day. It still haunted me, for the Caldera had been my friends. They had been kind and respectful to all who deserved their honor, and they spoke truthfully and directly. I had always preferred that over human schemes, and Raffael had destroyed it all.

But now the Caldera stood before me, and they didn’t seem to mind. There was no anger in the Spiritcaller’s wise eyes as he stepped closer.

“Pyaera.” He lowered his head slightly, drawing the other Caldera’s attention. Their eyes – crimson, glowing orbs – shifted from the Spiritcaller to me, then back again, before settling on me as they studied me intently. Recognition flashed within them, and while their expressions wavered for a moment, they quickly regained their composure.

“You are Spirit-touched,” one of them muttered.

“Fire’s Voice reached out to him in the Spires,” the Spiritcaller said in a calm, measured tone. “He is also connected to the Earthen Voice, but there is more, is there not, Pyaera?”

My lips parted one moment and sealed shut the next. What in the Spirits’ names was I supposed to say? Did he want me to talk about the Elemental Phoenix? In the first place… did the Spiritcaller know that I had bound Volix? What would he think about that?

I mean… it’s not like I bound him. He came to me. Forced himself upon me. I reminisced with a grimace, but my expression fell when I remembered that Volix was no longer with me.

“I… that’s a long story.” Even if it had been a while since we had last met, the Caldera didn’t deserve to be lied to. They deserved the whole truth after all that had happened, especially since they didn’t seem to hate me. Unless, of course, it was all a trick and they planned to kill me in some small, dirty alley.

“If you have some time to spare,” I cleared my throat, “I would like to tell you everything. About what happened to the Elemental Phoenix, how life has been for me, my encounter with the World Tree, and how the Fire Spirit brought me and my family to Dracos.”

The Caldera’s eyes widened at that, yet the Spiritcaller retained his calm composure and nodded slowly.

“And how I killed our Ruler of Fire when he found out that the Elemental Phoenix had bonded with me,” I added after a moment, earning vastly different reactions.

“You forced Fire’s Voice into a bond with you?” one of them exclaimed in outrage.

“Do you really think I could force an Emperor beast to bond with me?” That silenced the fuming Caldera, only for Orieath to step forward, his massive hands closing around mine.

“You killed a Ruler? Are you not a Youngling?”

Infant. Youngling. Spirit-touched. I hadn’t expected to hear those terms again, yet I couldn’t have been happier to hear them.

“Well, I did not kill him alone. If anything, I helped someone kill him,” I said with a shrug, though the corner of my lips curled upward.

“But you killed a Ruler,” Orieath repeated, the glow of his crimson orbs growing more intense by the moment. “Tell me all about it!”

The Spiritcaller stepped forward, one hand resting on the Blessed Caldera’s shoulder. “Take a deep breath, Youngling.”

He then turned to me with a faint smile. “I would like to hear your tale as well, Pyaera.”

So I rented a private room in the auction house using my new membership card, then told them everything that had happened since the Caldera left the Elemental Spires.